Alarm systems, such as fire alarm systems are commonplace and are typically used in commercial buildings of all types. Fire alarm systems, which are usually placed into buildings during the construction of those buildings, include numerous initiating devices (e.g., pull stations, smoke and heat detectors), notification appliances (e.g., sirens and strobes), and other devices typically disposed at or below the ceiling of each floor of a building, with each of the devices being electrically connected to fire alarm control panels within the building. Of course, there are many different kinds of alarm systems, and the type and design of an alarm system is generally based on a number of factors, such as the use of the building, what is stored in the building, cost effective routing of electrical wiring, etc.
In the past, fire alarm designers designed a fire alarm system for a particular building using a blueprint or layout drawing of the building. During this process, the designer selected the fire alarm system components to be used and designed the fire alarm system layout based on the locations of the walls, the ceilings, and other building elements. In addition, the designer designed the electrical connections between the fire alarm components. Faced with a large number of possibilities, this process was time consuming as it was manual in nature. In addition, the manual wiring process typically did not result in the most cost effective wiring scheme (e.g., the least amount of wire and wiring labor).